EDITORIAL: No room for two-tier sentences in our courts

Published Apr 17, 2026  •  2 minute read

The Ontario Superior Court of Justice building in downtown Windsor is pictured on Nov. 18, 2024. Photo by Dan Janisse / Files /Windsor Star

Ontario Superior Court Judge Antonio Skarica is a man of rare integrity. A former Ontario MPP, he was a thorn in the side of then-premier Mike Harris. He wasn’t a rabble-rouser. A former Crown attorney, he instead provided thoughtful criticism of his own government.

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First elected in 1995, when he ran for re-election in 1999, he told voters he’d quit if Harris moved forward with the amalgamation of municipalities in the Hamilton area he represented. When Harris did just that in 2000, Skarica didn’t cross the floor. He left the legislature with his head high.

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Skarica’s unafraid to speak truth to power. He was in the news this week when he lambasted members of the Canadian judiciary for prioritizing foreign-born lawbreakers over the needs of “vulnerable” Canadians.

In sentencing Boss Omeire, a Nigerian student who extorted a young woman and shared a sexually explicit image of her, leaving her in “constant fear,” Skarica wrote: “In my opinion, the Canadian justice system is at an inflection point. Who should get priority? Should it be a foreign-born individual with no current immigration status, who was granted the privilege of attending one of our educational institutions, and used that opportunity to abuse a law-abiding, honest, hard-working but vulnerable Canadian citizen? Asking that question provides the obvious answer.”

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“I believe that the accused was in large part successful in ruining the complainant’s life as he threatened and promised while the offence was occurring,” he added. Skarica sentenced Omeire to 28 months in prison.

The Crown attorney had asked for a sentence of one year less a day. The defence hadn’t specified a sentence, but his parents said they preferred a conditional sentence.

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This follows concerns expressed this month by Court of Quebec Judge Antoine Piche, who said prosecutors were creating a two-tier system by asking for more lenient sentences or absolute discharges for people at risk of deportation.

Words of wisdom from two judges.

Compare them to another recent case. Samir Abdelgadir, from Sudan, was found guilty of kidnapping a 14-year-old child. The National Post reports that the son of a diplomat had two years knocked off an 11.5-year sentence because he’d experienced anti-black racism, some of which occurred elsewhere.

That’s the kind of nonsensical two-tier sentencing Canada doesn’t need. We need to restore common sense to our courts.

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